The requests have not been ignored. There have been a lot of responses from Turbine. There have also been a number of improvements.

* Neighborhoods have a mailbox anyone can use at the central hub (remember, they didn't always have this).
* Escrow can be accessed from any banker, not only from special escrow NPCs.
* Houses are no longer locked down forever by inactive players. They are eventually foreclosed and returned to the market. This is no small update.
* Houses now have a single chest with full bank functionality (tabs you can name, searching, filtering, etc.). This is HUGE. No more running around trying to remember which chest things are in, much better organization of shared resources, less clutter in the house, etc.
* All houses can now have more total storage space.
* Standard houses can now have as much storage space as deluxe ones, so there's no penalty if your favorite house is small and cute.
* Unique items can now be stored in chests.
* There are many new house decoration items available, including two for Special hooks.

Turbine has been moving slowly, releasing upgrades as they go instead of making everyone wait for an uber-patch. The progress may not be as fast as you would like, but denying they have made any progress is ridiculous. While we were waiting for housing upgrades, we did get mounted combat, new zones, improved travel options, Laila's Market, epic battles at Helm's Deep, daily Hobbit gifts, the Bounder's server-wide events, and so much more.

I realize that Turbine made us think we would have more housing upgrades this year. I understand that they promised upgrades in the past that didn't happen. I'm just saying it's a terrible exaggeration to claim that they ignore us and don't give us anything.

The year's not over. Perhaps we'll see more improvements before the end of the year. If not, we might at least hear some news from Turbine. I'm willing to bet, however, that if they think they'll get flamed no matter what they post, we won't get any news at all.

Most of those changes were easy and should have been there from the beginning.

Short of eliminating the hook system, which will never happen, housing in this game is a complete failure. They could do a work around and make every square inch of every house 'hooked' and then you would get some sort of personalized placement but it still wouldnt be free placement, which ANY MMO in this generation should have.

They should call up Trion and ask them how much they have made on housing since RIFT went F2P a few months ago. I would bet they (Trion) made more in housing in that stretch than Turbine made on copy sales of this last expansion, and that isnt hyperbole. Several people have openly admitted to spending over 5K cash money on dimensions (rift housing) alone, that doesnt include the hundreds/thousands of others who have spent 100 bux or more. Housing and creating your own space/story is what MMOs used to be about. So the old school players who remember that, and the ones with the disposable real world funds take advantage of it when they can.

Turbine or WB or whomever is making the money decisions obviously doesnt grasp that. Sure it might cost some money up front to trash the current housing system and re do it completely differently, but the long term benefits outweigh that by a lot. But at this juncture who knows. The status quo is this game will last forever, but the shelf life to me looks a lot shorter than that. But housing and introducing new stuff to it is something that 'ending' the story wont affect in the slightest, and would be an obvious source of any future income.

I gave up expecting much from them just because you can only be disappointed so many times. Housing was really a no brainer for them and from the first time it appeared it was obvious it was just a bastardization of what they had in Ascherons Call (an at the time 9 year old game). They didnt even bother to use a more 'modern' version like they have in D&D. Which was in 2008 (when housing came to this game) outdated and old. Either way I doubt any 'major' changes happen. I imagine they think selling extra chest space and kicking people out who havent played ion years were 'good enough'.

Most of those changes were easy and should have been there from the beginning.

Short of eliminating the hook system, which will never happen, housing in this game is a complete failure. They could do a work around and make every square inch of every house 'hooked' and then you would get some sort of personalized placement but it still wouldnt be free placement, which ANY MMO in this generation should have.

They should call up Trion and ask them how much they have made on housing since RIFT went F2P a few months ago. I would bet they (Trion) made more in housing in that stretch than Turbine made on copy sales of this last expansion, and that isnt hyperbole. Several people have openly admitted to spending over 5K cash money on dimensions (rift housing) alone, that doesnt include the hundreds/thousands of others who have spent 100 bux or more. Housing and creating your own space/story is what MMOs used to be about. So the old school players who remember that, and the ones with the disposable real world funds take advantage of it when they can.

Turbine or WB or whomever is making the money decisions obviously doesnt grasp that. Sure it might cost some money up front to trash the current housing system and re do it completely differently, but the long term benefits outweigh that by a lot. But at this juncture who knows. The status quo is this game will last forever, but the shelf life to me looks a lot shorter than that. But housing and introducing new stuff to it is something that 'ending' the story wont affect in the slightest, and would be an obvious source of any future income.

I gave up expecting much from them just because you can only be disappointed so many times. Housing was really a no brainer for them and from the first time it appeared it was obvious it was just a bastardization of what they had in Ascherons Call (an at the time 9 year old game). They didnt even bother to use a more 'modern' version like they have in D&D. Which was in 2008 (when housing came to this game) outdated and old. Either way I doubt any 'major' changes happen. I imagine they think selling extra chest space and kicking people out who havent played ion years were 'good enough'.

I happen to agree here the housing system is severely out dated, but if we don't complain nothing will ever be changed. Point of fact is certain things in the world were changed because people complained. This should be no different we all in some way pay for this game just because one is a f2p player does not mean there experience is free...they put time and effort into this game which to some is just as much as paying cash money. These people deed till the y are blue in the face so they can enjoy the same things that people with Subs get. so in closing......

We could all benefit from a system that attracts people to visit randomly. The best thing ever would be to allow us to open a shop and sell from or homes Then random contact takes place and opens a whole new set of possibilities in game.

We could all benefit from a system that attracts people to visit randomly. The best thing ever would be to allow us to open a shop and sell from or homes Then random contact takes place and opens a whole new set of possibilities in game.

Doesn't work with this crafting system. Why should anyone bother to sift through a plethora of neighborhoods to search for the exact same thing he could get by just visiting the auction house?

To get people to visit the neighborhoods you'd probably need something like neighborhood quests and competitions. But social games in a game that is turning more and more antisocial and catering exclusively to the casual soloist are very unlikely to happen.

We could all benefit from a system that attracts people to visit randomly. The best thing ever would be to allow us to open a shop and sell from or homes Then random contact takes place and opens a whole new set of possibilities in game.

SWG had this but the houses were not in an instance. I actually would travel to different planets just to buy items I needed. SWG AH was little different but you could filter to only look at items sold from player vendors. In your house you could have crafting vendors for the different crafts you sold.

I am noticing the difference in my long term playing habits with LOTRO vs my long term playing habits with other games and the basic difference is housing. I spend nearly no time in LOTRO and still play EQII for the housing. Still kept up my sub to SWG long past the point where there was any actual play value for me in the game because I had so much fun with the housing.

LOTRO has become a series of expansions and level cap raises that requires so much grinding that it's not fun for me to play anymore. Normally I'd keep up a sub just to support the game and just putter around with crafting and housing but crafting holds no appeal for me in LOTRO (SWG set that bar pretty high) and the housing lacks any way to be creative or go outside a very limited system of hooks.

Update housing. It's been years. Stop focusing on a narrow range of players when deciding what to work on in the game and spend some time on housing, which brings you long term subs and increases revenue.

Aquilegia Astor Minstrel and Healer at Large Landroval Server
Proud Founding Member of H.O.M.E.

Living in moria would be just so awesome, right now it's just a congregation of scattared dwarf camps. Rohan needs housing too!
Make the homesteads available only to those who complete the respecitve epic questlines: more profit for Turbine, more fun for us.

I recently got a personal house, it has been fun but the fun dries up fast with the outdated and limited hook system. You are left with a hundred items you cannot place yet new items are added all the time.

The amount of money that could be made with a major redo of the whole housing system would be staggering. I am a lifetime member so don't pay real money for anything but the expansions, but honestly, I would pay actual money to get more hooks (or do away with that system all together) and be able to place more things in the house.

My scholar can't put a chair at her desk and sit and read, or use one at her huge breakfast table in the center of the room. She can't cook a meal because there isn't a kitchen. She can't take a bath because there isn't a bathroom. She can use the feasting table outside to have a meal with her hobbit neighbor (don't think too much about where the food came from with no kitchen), and she can lie down on her bed, or sit primly in a chair or bench against the wall. That's pretty much it. It's like a personal mathom house, but it sure isn't a home.

1. Ideally it would be amazing if our house had upgrades that were "phased" like Hytbold just for construction and space, interior and exterior (not furniture). I know this is really difficult to pull off for so many people so I'm labeling this my pipe dream.

2. The hook system has to go. Give us a toggle that allows us to place furniture anywhere we want. You've already successfully pulled it off with Barricades and Siege Weapons within big battles.

3. The house interior layout needs changing. Man and Dwarf are fine. Elf looks very ugly and Hobbit is downright ridiculous with all the open space full of zero furniture.

4. For the love of god, please make the ceiling color/design change with wallpaper choice.

5. I don't care if the exterior of our house is in a private instance that others need inviting too. If it's necessary to upgrade the system, it's fine. I don't ever see anybody in my homestead instance anyway.

I Love It, and One more

I Love the ideas I've been reading, and Agree with most of them. YES, Either More Hooks, or NO HOOKS, would be awesome!! Like in The Sims, just decide a grid like space value. I have a Deluxe & Kin house. I'm running out FAST, with WAY MORE STUFF I know I'll want later down the road (Only LVL 42).

My "One More" I posted somewhere else too. CRAFTING!!!! I want a Forge in my Yard, and a workbench inside, OR Out, PPPLLLLEEEEAAASSSEEEE

I have to say, no matter what Turbine does with a housing revamp, it wont nearly be enough. They could do a full freeform placement revamp, and it wouldnt even begin to compare with whats out there and whats coming out.

EQ2 had an incomparable housing system what, since 2006? DAoC had a pretty good system even earlier. Rift is fantastic with their freeform building system. Wildstar looks wonderfully creative too. And EQNext will take it a step further with their voxel system, when you can literally sculpt ANYTHING you can imagine, any kind of building or object with no limitations.

And here we are, just hoping we can move some stuff around on the walls of our prefab, boring little homes. My hobbit cant even live underground!!!

And the sad thing is, when I say a full freeform placement system wouldnt be enough, I think we all know they will probably just add some more hookpoints. Seriously, thats my prediction. Extra hookpoints.

Housing

Turbine should make it to where you can have multiple houses per account and have it to where you can port to friends houses or have it to where you can set an indicator on the map for a specific house you are looking for.

Well I always say this, but Turbine doesn't have oodles of resources like other games. Of course, if they did things like improve housing - which I think would inevitably result in more players - they might increase their revenue. Turbine needs more money so that they can work on cooler things and hire more people to do it.

There are so many people who throw money at this game, but there are so many people who WANT to throw money at this game. They need a good reason and improved housing is one of them.

A few responses to other comments:

1) Moria is a terrible place for housing. We need to keep it "lore-appropriate" if not "true-to-lore" and Moria housing would shatter any appropriateness whatsoever. There has been lore-breaking stuff in the past, but Turbine generally does well at integrating that. Lets be honest, the existence of this game is lore-breaking. However, Rohan homes might be nice...

2) YES YES YES we need free range on where we hook our things. The current layouts for most of the houses are terrible... I've switched houses like 6 times trying to find stylish arrangements and it is nearly impossible. Just give us a furniture-object limit and let us decorate wherever we want. (P.S. The might promote community because players could make their yards look even prettier and well-tailored for social events)

3) Having personal-crafting ability would kill another social aspect to the game. Nobody would interact in a crafting building and would just retreat to their houses. Personally, I love walking into the Bree crafting hall and finding piles of players bustling around crafting things. I may not interact with them much, but it's nice to see.

4) a market with vendors you can set up would be neat, but would players really flock to housing areas just to look for a specific item? We have an AH. It might not be pretty, but it works.

5) Quests would be cool. A Hytbold-style system would rock my world. I envision a system where we have to clean up a neighborhood, fend of raiding parties, and do other quests in order to reap the benefits of the area. It would be a community effort and require constant (though not terribly time-consuming) maintenance. We'd have to repair buildings to get vendors in and earn our own houses and possibly earn rep with the current residents to be trusted to settle.

Disappointed

I am quite disappointed that there will be no major housing change in the foreseeable future. That being said, this is my list of demands to make me happy until it happens :-)

1) Allow toons to buy houses. I would love to have the extra storage and ability to express my alt's personalities

2) Stables for homesteads. We have not had a lot of large plus items added in awhile. It would be great to store our horses in there so we could at least see them.

3) Either move the crafting to the neighborhoods or have a housing vendor in the crafting halls. It is ridiculous to have to travel to the housing areas to shop for discounted crafting items and then go back to the crafting hall to make it.

4) Yes, more hooks both in and out and a way to place things where we want them

5) And lastly...some cookies would be nice...just saying

I truly enjoy this game and I thank everyone at Turbine for giving us this product. I will be here as long as it exists and I applaud you all. Long live Lotro!

The way player housing in SWG was done was perfect. Sure LOTRO is a tad too far down the road to re-structure the entire hosuing thing. But I can tell you that when you can make and create things (with limits of course) within an MMO, it gives a player a sense of deeper ownership. This feeling is lacking in many MMO's made today where the main focus is on your character and items associated to yourself...instead of how you influence the world around you with your own creativity.

I like feeling as though I'm a part of the world that I'm playing in. I believe player creation in an MMO environment is critical to making individuals stay long term and commit. In most MMO's I have to force myself to believe that I have an influence on the world I'm in. When truly.....I don't. That's the key. That's what's missing in today's standard MMO.

The next MMO that can nail this again similar to how SWG did it will draw a massive cult following. The community has been waiting for the ability to be creative outside of just their player (again with limitations of course to ensure the game looks as it should because we all know it would get ugly fast).

Besides more or none hooks at all, I would love to be able to have more than just one house on my account. Each for every race would be awesome!
More floors, more rooms (instead of one big and two small rooms). A cellar or a attic, or both would be great!
Some of us have a huge yard and what 6 hooks to put up some stuff! That's ridiculous.

And I would love to see more furniture. Woodworkers should be able to create a LOT more. Scholars should be able to dye them.

I'd pay real money for those things, like most people would do.

Please update the housing! I'm sure the bigger part of the players wouldn't mind to buy a complete new house, when losing the old one would be the sacrifice for getting a brand new shiny home for their characters.
I wouldn't care! Stuff everything in the escrow and rebuild the housing system. Please!

Sad

/signed

Housing is one of the time sinks, I really do like. So I' m sad and disappointed that there won't be any great update.

I would take even small changes
- like changing all different sort of hooks to unified ones (items to hang at a wall / stand in front of a wall, stand-alone furniture on the floor, items for the yard) to enable a better placing of all kind of furniture (the class of the floor item all player can get at level 15 was changed in the past to small floor, so that might be able to do without overhauling the whole system
- make furniture movable in the space of the hook not just turnable (up / down at a wall if hanging, enable positions in the corners of a hook space),
- make hooks themselves movable on a grid
- make the furniture dyeable (or - give them the colour/structure slots for floor/wall like the house)
- more different craftable furniture that does fit together (one style)

Housing will stay as is with maybe a few small things added here & there. After learning what I have it seems any big changes would require them re-doing housing altogether & that is not gonna happen. It would be too costly & time consuming which Turbine doesn't have.

Heck if being able to purchase more then one standard/deluxe house per account/server is complicated, don't expect very much.

Time to look at reality & that is if after 7 years still no housing revamp, we won't be getting one.

You have a much better chance at winning the lottery then Turbine doing a housing revamp.

Housing will stay as is with maybe a few small things added here & there. After learning what I have it seems any big changes would require them re-doing housing altogether & that is not gonna happen. It would be too costly & time consuming which Turbine doesn't have.

Heck if being able to purchase more then one standard/deluxe house per account/server is complicated, don't expect very much.

Time to look at reality & that is if after 7 years still no housing revamp, we won't be getting one.

You have a much better chance at winning the lottery then Turbine doing a housing revamp.

Very true, given the official word that they don't intend to address housing ever. So here's to winning the lottery, I guess. /toasts

Call "still signing the petition" our Phial of Galadriel, a light in the darkness, when all other lights go out.